Unfortunately, I don't have the time or ability to mess around with mods, though this is minor mod territory. But... someone will do it. I know I'm not the only one to see this problem. "Sorry, I don't want to talk to you" doesn't give me any idea how close I am to them wanting to. Same with "sorry, you're not ready for a promotion," while I do quest after quest after quest without getting one. There's a hidden attribute integral to game progression and the game is hiding it from me, but has no trouble telling me I gained a point of swimming 20 hours after walking through a puddle. It's just bad game design. The player should be given a general idea of how much rep boost they need and what triggers the boost.

@BansheeXYZ: Funnily, I totally disagree with you and I do love that Interkarma has his principles in not adding to much optional stuff and instead leaves that to the community to work on later.

But back to the reputation. After my opinion it's a major point in not knowing what the other will think about you, because it feels like real life - or would you like to have an always changing post-it on your forehead which shows how much you (dis-)like the person in front of you? Same thing here somehow. It's just not realistic to know what other people may think about you. You just need to have the feeling how your rep is with the faction you want something from (did a lot of successful quests, than it should be positive e.g.). If you can't move on because of that, it's of course sad and maybe frustrating, but then you may not play classic RPGs in general (no offense! ). Daggerfall, at least for me, makes special that you are on your own, you role-play your character as you would in real life, if you get poisoned (which is very deadly in Daggerfall) you may search for an healer instead of reload the game, if you don't get the quests you want, you may have to wait a bit more or never get it, that's life...that is exactly what makes Daggerfall so remarkable in comparison to their sequels (Oblivion/Skyrim), as it doesn't show you everything and you are much more on your own gameplay-wise by hiding stuff (rep, exact locations,...), while the sequels give you exact quest descriptions or a compass...

So I understand why you wish that, and it may help people nonetheless, but, by reason, it is nothing which fits into Vanilla Daggerfall gameplay-wise as it would not feel right and real.

(just my personal, subjective opinion!)

Head of the German Daggerfall translation - www.daggerfalldeutsch.de
and German translator for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Lore-Expert for The Elder Scrolls: Online

Well the game has no trouble telling you specific skill and attribute values. Reality would be hiding those as well. Reality would also involve getting rid of fast travel, never being able to save, finite guards and monsters... I don't see how making charisma more visible breaks immersion. Baldurs Gate is an example of a game that tells you your rep on the character sheet, and when it changes.

And as far as guild promotions... In reality, an employer would say why you're short a promotion. They wouldn't just say no.

I really don't know why the original devs skipped this. How do modern elder scrolls games behave?

Guys, I enjoy the discussion - but this is now sidetracking the topic (which is the current roadmap update). There's nothing on the roadmap about changing Daggerfall's basic game design, because that's not part of my mission. The mod framework is there for exactly this purpose, and the beauty of mods is that people can choose which ones they like and want to install. Simple.

BansheeXYZ, you seem very passionate about this topic. Everything you need to do this is already possible with the mod framework right now. Why not raise the subject in the "Mods & Features General" forum and see if anyone salutes? If you just want to keep the conversation running on the relative merits of a visible reputation system, then "Community Discussion" if for the best.

Thanks for the update Interkarma. I havent realized how close we are to 0.4 version, it appeared so distant just a few months back. Being able to finish the main quest with a non mage character is a big thing. And your vision to have 0.5 ready this year is encouraging. I also like the added details on the future versions, something to look forward to. Your planned break after 0,5 is 100% understandable. You will freshen up after the difficult part to get your claws into the rest, which should progress easier according to your own words.

I cannon express my gratitude enough, because if it was not for you, my most favourite RPG ever would just bite the dust. Also your decission to implement the modding at this early stage has proven to bring the fruits, as some awesome mods are already ready and other are in the process of creation. Short notice on reputation - 100% agreement with Interkarma. Keep it vanila. Mods are exactly suited for this situation.

I just realized... No one's been to Mantella Crux to ensure all of its mechanics are working right, have they? I'll spend some time seeing if anything doesn't work the way it's supposed to. (If dialogue doesn't work I'll just skip to the next point, so don't worry about helping me. I just want to see whether the teleporters and crossbow work properly.)

Turns out it works great! The crossbow was a problem due to the altered gravity, no surprise there, but the real problems were on the Statue God puzzle. Running underneath each of the small statues triggered interaction with them, and in the end I didn't know how to get the force beams down on that puzzle.

Also, the new player hitbox means force beams don't mean what they used to. I could walk between vertical beams and crouch-jump above horizontal ones But the rest of the dungeon worked perfectly. Even Sheogorath and Benefactor had nice things to say.

King of Worms wrote:Thanks for the update Interkarma. I havent realized how close we are to 0.4 version, it appeared so distant just a few months back. Being able to finish the main quest with a non mage character is a big thing. And your vision to have 0.5 ready this year is encouraging. I also like the added details on the future versions, something to look forward to. Your planned break after 0,5 is 100% understandable. You will freshen up after the difficult part to get your claws into the rest, which should progress easier according to your own words.

I cannon express my gratitude enough, because if it was not for you, my most favourite RPG ever would just bite the dust. Also your decission to implement the modding at this early stage has proven to bring the fruits, as some awesome mods are already ready and other are in the process of creation. Short notice on reputation - 100% agreement with Interkarma. Keep it vanila. Mods are exactly suited for this situation.

Thanks KoW. I'm working like mad on the main quest now. Will probably roll this out in stages (groups of a few quests at a time). I'm cooking up a way for testers to reset and restart each stage of the main quest at any time. This lets us all focus on a particular group of quests without replaying the whole thing start to end. I'll outline my testing plans for this when I'm bit further along.

I'm a bit worried about how far into 0.5 I'll get before end of year, but if I can keep up my pace we should at least have some basic effects working (effects are the atomic stuff a spell does, and will be the groundwork of spell system).

Jay_H wrote:I just realized... No one's been to Mantella Crux to ensure all of its mechanics are working right, have they? I'll spend some time seeing if anything doesn't work the way it's supposed to. (If dialogue doesn't work I'll just skip to the next point, so don't worry about helping me. I just want to see whether the teleporters and crossbow work properly.)

Turns out it works great! The crossbow was a problem due to the altered gravity, no surprise there, but the real problems were on the Statue God puzzle. Running underneath each of the small statues triggered interaction with them, and in the end I didn't know how to get the force beams down on that puzzle.

Also, the new player hitbox means force beams don't mean what they used to. I could walk between vertical beams and crouch-jump above horizontal ones But the rest of the dungeon worked perfectly. Even Sheogorath and Benefactor had nice things to say.

Great to hear the Crux is working mostly OK. I did some testing around the time action system went in and noticed the force field problem as well. I plan to fix this by changing model's collider to a box at some point. It's only a few lines of code when I get there, no great problem.

Can you outline the issue with crossbow in a bit more detail for me? It's been over a year since I stuck my head in the Crux and I'm not sure what you mean about the gravity. Thanks mate.

Of course. The crossbow is intended to launch you from a flat surface up into the air, where you then wait for a huge sword to stop spinning so you enter the final doorway leading to the gem.
I just re-tested it and you don't even shoot out like in classic; you fall through and down to the floor. I've made a save game there, and I can send it when you need it.

Gotcha. Agreed, those special player physics don't translate very well into DFUnity at all just yet.

Please do send me a save though. Sometimes I like to take a break and work on something a bit different to clear my head. Hurling the player around should make for a fun change. I might even get to this sooner than later.